Encylopedia?

[Kourosism]

Can anyone recommend a good encyclopedia for Linux? I know that Encarta and Britannica can be put through WINE but I'm looking for a native alternative... does such a thing exist?

EDIT: And yes, looking at my subject line it would appear I need a dictionary as well. I have one of those, it was just a typo, honest.

[Crumpets and Jam]

Can anyone recommend a good encyclopedia for Linux? I know that Encarta and Britannica can be put through WINE but I'm looking for a native alternative... does such a thing exist?

EDIT: And yes, looking at my subject line it would appear I need a dictionary as well. I have one of those, it was just a typo, honest.

If you have access to the internet at all times, you can try Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org). It is very good and has millions of articles on pretty much everything.

If you are not connected to the internet most of the time, you can download Wikipedia quite simply.

Go to http://download.wikipedia.org (http://download.wikimedia.org/) and you'll see a list of all the databases. If you're looking for the English one it's "enwiki (http://download.wikimedia.org/enwiki/20080103)". Then you can choose to download a whole bunch of stuff ... but the file you generally want to download is "pages-articles.xml.bz2 (http://download.wikimedia.org/enwiki/20080103/enwiki-20080103-pages-articles.xml.bz2)". This contains current versions of article content, and is the archive most mirror sites will probably want.

They are only XML files for MediaWiki software that can be imported back in SQL databases using freely available php scripts. If you are looking for simple HTML files (standard webpages) that you can just open with your browser (Firefox) then download all the files from this link (http://static.wikipedia.org/downloads/November_2006/en/). You will be able to open the files. Ubuntu has its own extractor.

[Amstell]

If you have access to the internet at all times, you can try Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org). It is very good and has millions of articles on pretty much everything.

If you are not connected to the internet most of the time, you can download Wikipedia quite simply.

Go to http://download.wikipedia.org (http://download.wikimedia.org/) and you'll see a list of all the databases. If you're looking for the English one it's "enwiki (http://download.wikimedia.org/enwiki/20080103)". Then you can choose to download a whole bunch of stuff ... but the file you generally want to download is "pages-articles.xml.bz2 (http://download.wikimedia.org/enwiki/20080103/enwiki-20080103-pages-articles.xml.bz2)". This contains current versions of article content, and is the archive most mirror sites will probably want.

They are only XML files for MediaWiki software that can be imported back in SQL databases using freely available php scripts. If you are looking for simple HTML files (standard webpages) that you can just open with your browser (Firefox) then download all the files from this link (http://static.wikipedia.org/downloads/November_2006/en/). You will be able to open the files. Ubuntu has its own extractor.

Thanks for that. Good stuff

[Crumpets and Jam]

Thanks for that. Good stuff

No problem. There might be some 'true' encyclopedia software for Linux, I'm not sure. Wikipeda seems to be the latest hype on the internet though. I seem to be on there a lot when I have to do my homework. :p

[bengalsfan74]

Unfortunately, my college professors don't allow Wikipedia entries, as its not a "legitimate" encyclopedia, and can be edited by anyone.

If anyone knows of any software like Encarta or a Britannica reference for Linux, that would be great. Haven't been able to find anything yet.

[jken146]

Unfortunately, my college professors don't allow Wikipedia entries, as its not a "legitimate" encyclopedia, and can be edited by anyone.

If anyone knows of any software like Encarta or a Britannica reference for Linux, that would be great. Haven't been able to find anything yet.

They probably want you to cite some of the relevant academic literature (books, publidhed articles...). Try searching your college's library.